★★☆☆☆ One era’s genre cinema becomes another generation’s cultural harvest. As the cycle repeats itself, the line between pastiche and revisionism becomes increasingly tenuous and viewers can find themselves becoming lazy purveyors of B-movie nostalgia. For revivalism to work, the film must primarily function on its own terms. It can Continue Reading
★★☆☆☆ Angelina Jolie has stated that she has given up on acting and is now solely a director. If her sophomore effort Unbroken (2014) – a biopic of Olympian long distance runner and World War II POW Louis Zamperini (Jack O’Connell) – is to be taken as evidence, it might Continue Reading
★★★☆☆ Strap on your sandals and unsheath your swords! Ridley Scott has cinematically traversed ancient Rome with Gladiator (2000) and the crusades with the abysmal Kingdom Of Heaven (2005), now he invites audiences to ancient Egypt, to recount the Old Testament in Exodus: Gods and Kings (2014). As ever, he Continue Reading
Welcome to our rundown of the top ten films of 2014. To see the cinematic delights that comprised the rest of our top twenty, check out our first post here. We’d also like to take the time to mention some of the films that narrowly missed out but remain deserving Continue Reading
It’s that time of year where we brace ourselves for what’s to come. Yet before we say au revoir to 2014 the CineVue team has taken the time to cogitate on the cinematic delights of the past twelve months. This year we’ve decided to split the list in two; partly Continue Reading
★★☆☆☆ Not even the promise of sunshine can save the one-note exercise in musical adaptations that is Annie (2014). Helmed by Will Gluck (of Easy A (2010) notoriety), this adaptation of the 1977 Broadway musical delivers on sights and sounds, but sadly, there is little meat on these bones. Screenwriter Continue Reading
★★★★★ A meditative, often gruelling slowburner which explores concepts of ‘home’, Tsai Ming-liang’s remarkable Stray Dogs (2013) seeks to investigate the poor’s right to their own city within a phantasmagorical urban landscape. An immensely bittersweet work, Tsai evokes the poetry and tragedy of life lived on the margins of society. Continue Reading
★★★★★ There Will be Blood (2007) gave us the birth of American capitalism, The Master (2012) doused us in the uncertainty of post-war malaise and now Inherent Vice (2014) takes us to the crossroads of the modern Californian ethos. This is Paul Thomas Anderson’s American history trilogy – how the Continue Reading
★★★★☆ Since as far back as his third feature, 1997’s Ossos, the work of auteur Pedro Costa has frequently explored the troubled Lisbon district of Fontainhas. In a loose trilogy he has chronicled the existential wanderings of impoverished immigrants, most recently in Colossal Youth (2006), which focused on the Cape Continue Reading
★★★☆☆ Respect is a funny old thing. In order to get a little, you also have to give a little. What Sacha Bennett’s sixth full feature, We Still Kill the Old Way (2014), stylishly and cheekily showcases the ramifications of children not seeing their way to respecting their elders. It knows Continue Reading
★★☆☆☆ Boring, befuddling and slightly out-of-touch are all criticisms that can be aimed squarley atSex Tape (2014). In what is seemingly just a ninety minute product placement for the nifty capabilities of Apple products, this sex comedy falls limp very quickly, despite it being built on the premise of hot-blooded Continue Reading
★★☆☆☆ Nordic noir has been doing brisk trade on both page and screen over the last few years, cannily stimulating an apparently global appetite for a slew of flawed detectives and macabre investigations from the region. Although there have been some successful cinematic outings, it is actually on the small Continue Reading
★★☆☆☆ It’s unlikely that The Guvnors (2014) is going to be admitted to the canon of gangland crime thrillers in the near future. A middling script, poor direction and a varying array of stereotypical performances all contribute to the gathering inertia of director Gabe Turner’s sophomore feature (his first as Continue Reading
★★★☆☆ The feature debut from Mad Men actor John Slattery (who plays the wonderfully urbane Roger Sterling in the hit AMC show), God’s Pocket (2013) may not share the same air of sophistication as the stylish ad industry ratings winner, but this sleazy tale of small town Joes and two-bit hustlers Continue Reading
For a filmmaker responsible for an insightful opening of the curtain of an arts institution like he does on Vienna’s Kunsthistorisches Museum (KHM) in The Great Museum (2014) it was grounding when CineVue chatted to Johannes Holzhausen on Skype, sitting in what looked like a store room in his offices. Continue Reading